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Toral lateral line units of goldfish, Carassius auratus, are sensitive to the position and vibration direction of a vibrating sphere

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Abstract

We recorded the responses of lateral line units in the midbrain torus semicircularis of goldfish, Carassius auratus, to a 50-Hz vibrating sphere and determined the unit’s spatial receptive fields for various distances between fish and sphere and for different directions of sphere vibration. All but one unit responded to the vibrating sphere with an increase in discharge rate. Only a proportion (25 %) of the units exhibited phase-locked responses. Receptive fields were narrow or broad and contained one, two or more areas of increased discharge rate. The data show that the receptive fields of toral lateral line units are in many respects similar to those of brainstem units but differ from those of afferent nerve fibres. The responses of primary afferents represent the pressure gradient pattern generated by a vibrating sphere and provide information about sphere location and vibration direction. Across the array of lateral line neuromasts, the fish brain in principle can derive this information. Nevertheless, toral units tuned to a distinct sphere location or sensitive to a distinct sphere vibration direction were not found. Therefore, it is conceivable that the torus semicircularis uses a population code to determine spatial location and vibration direction of a vibrating sphere.

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Abbreviations

HMW:

Half maximum width

MON:

Medial octavolateralis nucleus

RF:

Receptive field

SEP:

Spatial event plot

TS:

Torus semicircularis

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Acknowledgments

We thank V. Schlüssel for comments on the manuscript, W. Braun for taking care of the fish and S. Clifford for help with the data analysis scripts. The research reported in this paper was performed under the guidelines by current German animal protection law. Use of animals and experimental procedures were approved by the Landesamt für Natur, Umwelt und Verbraucherschutz Nordrhein-Westfalen, permission no. 50.203.2-BN 7, 14/05. This research was supported by the Bioinspired Concepts (BIC) program funded by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the BioSenSE program funded by the Defense Advanced Research Program Agency (DARPA) and the BMBF.

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  1. Institute of Zoology, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-University Bonn, Poppelsdorfer Schloß, 53115, Bonn, Germany

    Gunnar Meyer, Adrian Klein, Joachim Mogdans & Horst Bleckmann

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  1. Gunnar Meyer
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  2. Adrian Klein
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  3. Joachim Mogdans
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Correspondence to Joachim Mogdans.

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Meyer, G., Klein, A., Mogdans, J. et al. Toral lateral line units of goldfish, Carassius auratus, are sensitive to the position and vibration direction of a vibrating sphere. J Comp Physiol A 198, 639–653 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00359-012-0736-z

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